


talk me down

by emmaswoodhouse



Category: I'll Give You the Sun - Jandy Nelson
Genre: M/M, Missing Scene, Reconciliation, Reunions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-01
Updated: 2020-01-01
Packaged: 2021-02-27 16:07:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,707
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22069768
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emmaswoodhouse/pseuds/emmaswoodhouse
Summary: "The thing was I’d tried to get over him. I tried to convince myself he was some dumb puppy-love crush I had when I was 14 and he was the first guy who ever paid any attention to me. But my inner-Noah, the real Noah, the one I’d kept buried deep inside of me for two years, was no idiot. He knew Brian was it. My best friend. My favorite person in the entire world. The one I’d give up my immortality for. The one I’d cut off all my fingers to be with.The one slowly and steadily walking towards me right this second."Noah and Brian's reunion from Noah's POV.
Relationships: Brian Connelly/Noah Sweetwine
Comments: 10
Kudos: 72





	talk me down

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from the Troye Sivan song of the same name. Enjoy! ^^

Jude has been staring at me for the last hour or so and I’m afraid I’ve been staring at the computer screen for at least twice as long. The three simple words in the e-mail burning into every single fiber of my soul with the fire of a thousand suns.

_I’ll be there._

I haven’t been able to draw a breath since I opened it because I’m pretty sure that the moment I do, the moment I twitch or blink or make any kind physical movement, the words might just disappear and I’ll be hit with the devastating reality that I only imagined them. It’s not like it would be the first time. The only thing I manage to do is open my mouth and force my vocal cords to yell out my sister’s name, my eyes still refusing to look away from the monitor. As soon as Jude pops in the doorway I point at the screen, hoping she’ll figure out what to do. As always with the two of us, she does.

“Holy Clark Gable.”, she exhales quietly while she stares between me and the e-mail (apparently it is real) and after blinking once, twice, three times begins frantically jumping around my room, on my bed, thanking Grandma and every single being she’d been praying to for making this happen. “Don’t you _see_ , Noah?” her voice almost sings. “This was my wish! The wish I made to the angel in Guillermo’s studio!” I shiver. I’m still not used to _that guy’s_ name being thrown around so casually. Especially in our house. It feels like we’re betraying dad. “I wished for you and Brian to make up and it actually freaking _worked_!” She lets out an honest-to-God _squeal_. My sister, the weirdo. I won’t ever tell her but I really did miss her. Still, she was riding the crazy train a bit too far out of town this time.

“Jude...” I allow my eyes to finally leave the screen, knowing now that the e-mail can’t possibly get swept away by the waves outside. “We won’t be making _anything_ up, okay?” Her face immediately falls. “He probably just wants to rub it in my face how much better he’s doing without me. I mean, you saw the articles, right? He’s basically The Gay Rock Star of the baseball world.” Jude rolls her eyes so far back, they fall out of her head and topple on the floor.

“Why you gotta ruin everything, Noah? Why can’t this just be _a nice thing_ happening to you because you deserve it?” She looks straight into my eyes and I see mom reflecting in hers. And it hurts. But it also makes a lot of damn sense that she’d be there. It sounds exactly like something she would say. Jude realizes the same thing as soon as she says it. So I decide to let her have hope. Let both of them have it. Let me be the realist for once.

“You’re right. We’ll see how it goes.” I give her a light smile and she starts jumping for joy on my bed again. And even though I’d only said it to make her feel better, as soon as I let hope fall out of my mouth, it travels all the way to my stupid heart, and it buries itself there. And it grabs my throat and doesn’t let go until I give in, until I let myself _hope_. Hope that he did answer me so he could see me, because he missed me, because he’d spent the last two years thinking about me every single day and every single night like I had. And I hate myself for it, but I do it. I start _hoping_.

Who knew hope was such a sadistic asshole?

***

I sit at the same spot I’ve been waiting at every week for the last two years. Only this is the first time there’s a chance he’ll actually show up. And it’s mortifying. Before I would just sit there and imagine everything I’d tell him if he did come, how I’d beg him to forgive me and he would and we’d live happily ever after. It was a stupid dream but whatever. It was my dream and it could be whatever I wanted it.

The thing was I’d tried to get over him. I tried to convince myself he was some dumb puppy-love crush I had when I was 14 and he was the first guy who ever paid any attention to me. But my inner-Noah, the _real_ Noah, the one I’d kept buried deep inside of me for two years, was no idiot. He knew Brian was it. My best friend. My favorite person in the entire world. The one I’d give up my immortality for. The one I’d cut off all my fingers to be with.

The one slowly and steadily walking towards me right this second.

My heart catches in my throat and it simultaneously begins pounding at an inhuman rate. My feet are giving out and I’m _so glad_ I’m sitting on this rock except I’m afraid I’ll never be able to move from it ever again. Or speak. Or breathe. I’ll become another rock placed on this slightly bigger rock.

“Hey.” Brian says in this ridiculously casual tone. As if we’d never been apart at all. I’m still not sure I’m not dreaming again. Although to be fair, whenever I imagined this moment I felt like way less of a mess who can’t stand up or get a word out.

“Hey.” I _casually_ say back. I try my best so sound like fake-Noah. Jock-Noah. Popular-asshole-guy-Noah. I’ve perfected him by now. He doesn’t care about anything. Or anyone. He’s just _so over_ everything. Wow. Who knew he’d be _actually useful_ eventually?

“You look…tall.” Brian licks his lips and my brain explodes all over the trees in the forest. _I_ explode. Everything I’ve been imagining saying just…comes out. I can’t stop it. It’s too fucking over-due.

“Look, Brian.” Just saying his actual name for the first time in two years, to _his_ _face_ , makes me shiver. “I don’t know what made you agree to see me. Maybe it _was_ my sister and her magic wishing angel or some shit but…” He raises his eyebrows at that and smirks a little. “Now that you’re here – I’m sorry. For everything I did. I was a first class asshat who couldn’t deal with his own issues so he decided to create some for you. So we could be equally miserable. I just couldn’t handle how fucking perfect you were. Also, my life was completely falling apart when I did… _what I did_. Not that that excuses me in any way but… I was a stupid kid. And I never meant to hurt you. How could I? You were…” He looks up at me and squints, he _knows_ just how long I’ve waited to get this out. “You were everything.” _You still are._ I think I’m crying. Maybe just on the inside, maybe not. But it doesn’t really matter. He _sees_ it. He knows I mean it.

“Noah…” he moves closer to me as he says it and I feel his breath on my face. I close my eyes because it’s too much. “Please look at me.” I do. As much as it hurts. Fuck, I’d forgotten that magical color of his eyes. I could never get them right in my paintings. “What you did, it _did_ hurt me at the time but…I’ve forgiven you a long time ago. If it weren’t for you I never would have gotten the courage to come out to my entire high school and that was the best decision I ever made. What happened between us made me realize living a lie was stupid and pointless. It made me _miserable_. I wasn’t being true to myself, to my…” Don’t say it, _don’t fucking say it_. “To my heart.” Of course he had to mirror one of the last things my mom had said to me. Of-fucking-course. My whole body hurts. And I’m definitely crying now. I must be because the next thing I feel is Brian’s arms around me, him telling me it’s okay and that he’s here and it’s _too much_ and it makes me cry even harder. How did she do it? How did she manage to be here for me even though she’s dead? I’m too tired to ask questions anymore. I melt into Brian’s arms and it really is okay. For the first time in the longest time. I’m free.

“I think this is the most I’ve ever heard you speak.” Brian laughs into my shoulder and I feel like the sun has eaten me whole and I’m now just a sunbeam shinning down on the world.

***

As Brian and I come out of the woods, I take his hand. He smiles his half-smile over at me but as soon as he sees my dad on our roof next to Jude he quickly pulls away _._ I shake my head. _Not this time. Not anymore._ I swiftly take his hand back in mine and intertwine our fingers. I’m not scared of my dad. He will understand. I know now that he loves me enough to understand.

Behind us my sister smiles proudly. I don’t see her, but I know she does.

***

We sit under a tree and watch the sun go down. Brian plays with my fingers and talks to me about his baseball team and the stars, things I’ll probably never understand, but I never want him to stop talking. And I play with his hair, once again lightning white, telling him about mom and Jude and CSA.

“You _have_ to apply.” He says to me, his eyes looking right into my soul. “It’s your dream.” I kiss the back of his hand.

“ _This_ is my dream.” I tell him because it’s the damn truth.

We kiss softly and slowly, for hours and hours, not like a couple of horned-up teenagers hiding from the world in the woods. Like we’re meeting for the first time all over again. Like atoms finding each other in darkness. Like people coming home.

I am finally home again.


End file.
